Cold Shadows and Inspiration
by startanew
Summary: {Pagan’s Crusade} (Catherine Jinks) Set in 1187, Jerusalem. The Crusades. 16 year old Pagan Kidrouk is haunted by his past, by his present and by his future. Set just before the novel begins. RR please.


**Disclaimer: I do not own Pagan. He belongs to the fantastic Catherine Jinks.**

_A/N: The "Pagan" series was my favourite series as a younger teenager than I am now, and I definately still love it. If you have not heard of it, it follows an extremely sarcastic boy of the early medieval era, and he is of partially ethnic descent, is Christian, and can read, (he was taught in a monastery). This makes him very special for his time. The series starts with 16 year old Pagan Kidrouk joining the Templar Monks, who were a sort of religious knight who fought in holy crusades, such as The Crusades being foughtover the Holy Lands. He is paired as a squire with Lord Roland, a frenchman who hardly ever shows any emotion, but who eventually becomes the best friend that Pagan ever had.I find the series utterly brilliant. Look out for it. The style of the novels are totally different to this piece, I think. Catherine writes the stories as first person. _

_This piece is set the night before the first novel. I really hope you like it, and that you comment on it._

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May, 1187, The Kingdom of Jerusalem 

Pagan closed his eyes and fell into timelessness, the brutal force of his daily existence dragging him down, deep into the unknown that he visited each night. The darkness wove itself lazily around his mind, then faded into light, freeing his vision. He now stood in a long empty street, harsh in the sunlight. Vacant market stalls lined the road, their hangings flapping in a breeze he could not feel. There was something at the end of the street. He did not know what it was but he knew he wanted to get there. He felt little fear as he began to walk.

Dark figures began to move in the corner of his eye, staring at him. He spun. Nothing was there but an identical market, fading into the horizon, blurring at the edges like a desert mirage. He turned again, and the world reeled around him. When it stopped, the market was still there. And so were the figures just out of his line of sight, waiting, watching. He could sense them. He listened. Something was very strange. The only sound was his own rasping breath. No market noises, no wind, nothing. It was as if the entire city was abandoned or asleep. He almost instantly forgot about it and the shadows and kept walking towards whatever it was. It was moving further away, and he felt lost without it. But he kept walking after the obscurity as if it was his only hope.

Heat radiated off the mud walls of the market place as he walked through the narrow street, but he could feel cold stares behind him again. The shadows. He remembered them. He shivered and slowly turned again, hoping to catch the dark figures off their guard. There was nothing, and the sky began to spin above him. The markets began to fade away. Pagan just stood, waiting. Waiting for what? He did not know.

With a clang, bells began to peal. Pagan reacted by walking immediately to the chapel in fear of being late. But there was no chapel. Of course there was no chapel… there hadn't been a chapel in his life for years. But the bells kept urging him to attend. This wasn't right. He stood confused, and his surroundings darkened from the bright summer day to something else.

He could see the rows of beds in a semi darkened room. Tiny unglazed windows up high. Sparse and comfortless. Each bed with a small boy or two lying asleep in it. Pagan seemed to glide between and over their sleeping forms, not taking a step. He could see that several boys had marks of the cane across their bare backs. He realised where he was. The dormitory. He was back in the dormitory! The monastery! Panic welled inside him, choking him. He wanted to run, run away and never return. Would he never escape this horrible place? He looked down at his hands, expecting to see matching welt marks. There were none. There were not even the marks and calluses of adult work. His hands were instead smooth and delicate. Everything grew taller around him. He knew he could not escape. He sank to the ground; feeling like a pit was opening in his chest deepening with every resounding heart beat. He saw the pity and fear in all the boys' eyes as they lay watching him. He knew these boys. He knew every one of them. Especially one, he realised.

No! This wasn't right! He'd already escaped! They couldn't make him go back. He was sixteen years old, they couldn't! He was not a child. No. Everything in the room began to shrink again, and Pagan leapt from the floor, and in one swift movement swept his young battered self from his bed where he slept next to his best friend. He began to run for the gaping doorway, but a fire ignited in front of him, heating the stones beneath his suddenly bare feet. He jumped back, looking for some escape. The doorway was blocked, and there was no where else to go. He felt like he couldn't breathe. He set his younger self down, but kept his hands on his shoulders. He scanned the room, looking for help, any help. A small pale haired boy sat up in bed, his eyes large and staring with fear. Staring behind him. The boy cowered, little hands grasping the rough cloth of the blanket. Pagan looked behind him, expecting to see one of the monks standing with that disapproving glare filled with pious hatred and revenge. Not a monk. Joscelin, smelling of perfume, a leer creeping across his face as he reached for a cane rather than clenching his fists as Pagan would have expected him to.

"Where's my money you little cretin?" he hissed. His eyes showed too much white, and he pushed young Pagan away.

Pagan tried to respond, tried to move, but he could not. Joscelin towered over him, that cruel, sadistic smile upon his face, and the cane rose, and came down with a horrifying whack on bare skin.

"What's the matter, lost your wit?" he taunted, raising his arm to strike again.

Other faces seemed to appear above Pagan as he was beaten to the ground. Some he recognised, some he did not. He reached out to the kind looking ones, desperate, knowing they were only faces, and could not help him now. Only memories. Others sneered at him from above, laughing at his distress.

Stained glass windows smashed, he could somehow watch them even though there were none in the flame filled dormitory room. Their translucent faces were destroyed one by one with each belt of the cane. And his younger self cried.

"I'll get your money! I'll get it!" Pagan cried out in his sleep, holding up his hands as if fending off an invisible assailant. With a jerk, he woke, breathing hard. His hair flopped in his eyes as he struggled to get to his feet, still expecting an attack. He could feel the weather on his skin. He was awake. He calmed, his heart started returning to its normal beat, and he became aware that his hand hurt, must have grazed it while flailing about on the ground. He hoped that no one had seen him. He could not afford the new beatings that he would get if it were discovered that he cried in his sleep like some sort of woman. But he saw the man on the street corner staring at him as if he were a madman. Maybe he was. How did he get himself into these situations. He deserved better. Or maybe he didn't. He tried to breathe, to calm himself. He sank back to the sandy ground.

He rarely dreamed. Why would he, he had nothing to hope for, and so much to fear in waking moments that he could not afford to fear in sleep. Daily existence usually required him to sleep in a way that allowed him to wake quickly whenever a drunken guard wanted to use him for knife practice, or in case the someone who owned the doorway decided that before dawn was a good time to open it. The rest of existence, he didn't really want to think about right now.

Why could he not have better? He did not expect the sky to suddenly rain gold coins, or for his mother to miraculously want him again.No, all he wanted right now was to pay off his stupid gambling debt and to perhaps have some semi decent clothes on his back and some food in his stomach. And possibly not be punched, kicked or spat on quite so many times a day.

He could hear bells in the distance and for a moment thought that he was still asleep and dreaming. No, it came from the Templars… The Templars! He had heard they were recruiting new squires! They'd feed him, clothe him. He could certainly manage having to look after some dumb animal for a while until they paid him enough to pay back his debts. And he wouldn't mind the horses either, he thought with a mild smile.

Darkness began to fade at the edges until it had a slightly pale blue glow to it. He curled back up on the ground, one arm cushioning his head against the dirt. Pagan smiled. He finally had a plan, a goal, or at least a partial solution. As soon as the sun had risen, he'd join the Templar Knights.

Fin

_Thanks so much for reading, I really appreciate it! Now, if it's not too much trouble, I'd love it if you would click the little button and submit a review to me. Even if it's just one word, though I'd prefer a few sentences. It's important to me, as i'm practicing my writing and need to know if I'm heading in the right direction. Oh, and don't forget to look out for Catherine Jink's Pagan series! If anyone else here has read it, I dare you to write a fiction on it! _


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